Chapter 11

1920-1934 EDUCATION, MARRIAGE, BEGINNING OF THE NEXT GENERATION THE GREAT DEPRESSION-FARM LOST

During this time, as Louisa had anticipated, some of her boys were meeting wonderful women and getting married. There is a story about the Woodstock house and a Warner boy s romance. The house on the farm that MH bought was built by the grandfather of Esther Mae Winget. She lived in Chillicothe but often came to Woodstock to visit her relatives. She often stayed with Sarah Ingram, a neighbor of the Warners.

Some of the Warner boys were invited to a gathering at the Ingrams where Roger and Rodney met Esther. The story was told later that Roger had made a date with two of the girls and Rodney stepped in to cover for him by keeping Roger s date with Esther. It seems that one of the Warner qualities is the ability to really turn on the charm during courtship. Both of the ladies in this picture are wearing the uniforms they wore while working at the Worthington Children s Home. Their hair is fastened up in back as was the fashion of the day. I wish we could see more of the detail in the quality of the suits the twins are wearing.

Rodney, Esther, Jesse and Roger

Roger was the first to marry. He married Jesse Von McAdams from Cable, Ohio, on January 2, 1920, while still in college. She was working at the Worthington Children s Home. Soon the next generation was making its appearance. Roger and Jesse named their firstborn Paul Wesley, born November 16, 1921. He was born in the Woodstock house where Jesse was staying while Roger was at Ohio State. Roger graduated in 1922 and began teaching Vocational Agriculture in Ashley, Ohio, that year. Juanita Von (Warner) Crawley was born June 3, 1923. Harvey Victor waited until February 24, 1930. Roger received his MA from Ohio State in 1931.

What impressions were these Warner men making? Jesse & Roger Warner There is a clue of what they were like in a document

written by Esther Winget, April 5, 1920, while she was either considering RJ as a suitor or perhaps as a future husband.

Esther wrote:

On the fifth day of April in the year of our Lord One Thousand and Nine Hundred

and Twenty I take my pen in hand and attempt to characterize the Honorable R. J.

Warner. He is a man of medium height and build, has auburn hair, blue grey eyes,

and a rather pleasing open countenance. My first impression upon meeting him was

that he was one of the most genteel and religious young men I had ever met. He

stands out alone among many as a young man who from early childhood to maturity

has walked in the way of the Lord. Religion has been his constant companion. His

loyalty to God and friend is quite marked. He is composed, patient and tolerant with

those who sorely try him. Principle and right are his guide stones. Self-confidence is

shown in his various lines of work. He speaks success and finds it. Unselfishness and

freedom from jealously are two marked characteristics in his makeup.

Tho he be energetic, honest, pure of heart, virtuous, intelligent and Christian he is

not without blemish for he is human. We find him somewhat conceited or egotistical.

He is inclined to be dominant over those with whom he is closely associated. His

seriousness of thought is beyond his years and somewhat perplexing. It takes a solver

of riddles to understand him thoroughly to distinguish between joke and truth. He is

abrupt and free of speech, yet to those who know him best, this is an admirable quality

- to the stranger it might appear gross.

Everyone has their hobby. Psychology is his. He must know the ways and wherefore

of everything that he is interested in and as well the psychological effect. he is a

student seeking to learn the best that he may be the better prepared to serve Him whom he

loves and to serve humbly and trust in all things. Esther Mae Winget

Esther Winget graduated from the Missionary Training School in Cincinnati and later from the Chautauqua School of Nursing, New York. She was elected as Supervisor of the Nursery at the Methodist Children s Home, Worthington, Ohio, in 1919 and remained there three years. While there she had full responsibility of receiving the children less than four years of age and selecting the foster homes for the adoptable babies. During this period 79 children were placed in homes for adoption. Esther was a supporter of the Women s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU). This effort had grown out of colonial Puritanism and by 1835 nearly all

Esther Winget Warner Protestant churches supported temperance as a

solution to some of the problems of society. Prohibition began Jan 16, 1920. That same year, with the passage of the 19^th Amendment, she would have taken seriously her right to vote in the presidential election in the fall of 1920. The two presidential candidates were both from Ohio. Warren G. Harding and James Cox both had visited Woodstock during the Red Cross fund-raising event.

After Esther s written consideration, she accepted RJ s proposal and they planned a wedding including members from both of their families.

Rodney and Esther Winget were married on September 9, 1920. Theirs was a church wedding in Chillicothe with his sister, Ethel, as the ring bearer. After they were married they both worked at the Worthington Children s Home while he attended Ohio State. Esther was responsible for the care of babies that were available for adoption. Rodney had custodial duties, firing the furnaces and cleaning. He often delivered adopted children to their new homes, usually on the Interurban rail cars. Rodney also taught in Worthington 1921-22 and was the principal of East Linden 1922-23. Rodney graduated from Ohio State 1922 and received his MA 1927. The year before this he bought his first house seven miles west of Columbus in New Rome, Ohio (131 Pasadena Ave). I was born here. James Mordecai was born December 12, 1922; Rodney David, December 8, 1924; Robert Louis, August 25, 1928 and Elvira Mae (Warner) Covey, December 13, 1932.

Rodney and Esther Warner

The Chillicothe Newspaper printed the following Story about the wedding:

At noon Thursday in the Methodist Episcopal Church in Andersonville, Ohio, Miss

Esther Mae Winget of Worthington, daughter of Mrs. Margaret E. Winget near this

city, became the bride of Mr. Rodney Johnson Warner of Woodstock, Ohio.

The bridal couple entered the church together to the strains of Lohegrin s Wedding

March, played by Miss Elizabeth Stout. They were preceded to the altar by the ring

bearer, Ethel Warner, the maid of honor, Miss Esther Y. Peitsmeyer of Worthington,

and the best man, Mr. Gail Guyton of Woodstock. The double ring ceremony was

read by Dr. Austin Phillpot of Delaware.

The church was pretty with decorations of autumn flowers, palms and ferns. The

bride s gown was of white crepe de chine with crystal bead trimmings. Her veil was

caught with a wreath of orange blossoms and she carried a bouquet of sweetheart roses.

She wore a string of pearls, the gift of the bride-groom. The maid of honor wore a frock

of pale green georgette with white net trimmings and carried white asters. The ring

bearer, sister of the bridegroom, wore light yellow organdie. The bride s gift to her

maid of honor was a beautiful gold pin, and she presented the ring bearer an amethyst

set ring. Mr. Warner s gift to his best man was a pair of cuff links.

Five generations of the bride s family were among the one hundred and fifty guests.

The oldest was Mrs. Mary Ann Dunlap who is one hundred and two years of age, the

bride s great aunt .

Fifty guests were invited to the reception and wedding dinner at the home of the

bride s mother. Decorations were in green and yellow. Mr. and Mrs. Warner left for a

motoring trip, not making their destination known. The bride s going away suit was of

midnight blue tricotine with a velvet hat to match

We do know about the honeymoon motoring trip. On more than one occasion, Esther, my mother, told about visiting many of the Warner relatives in the hills of eastern Ohio. At each stop they wanted the new bride and groom to have something to eat. Mom always ended the story with what one of them had said, Come on folks, let s watch em eat.

The RJ Warner-Winget Wedding Party

Thurman took over the chores of the oldest boy at home. His day started at four in the morning with a trip to the woodshed for kindling to build a fire in the kitchen cook stove. Then he removed ashes and brought in coal for the heater in the living room. During his senior year he fell in love with a young freshman girl who lived with her mother and grandmother. She was an only child having lost a sister and her father. Her mother, Lena Woodward, was an operator in the new telephone exchange. Thurman and Josephine Woodward, both from Woodstock, eloped on Halloween during his senior year 1921. Thurman was eighteen and Jo was fifteen. Thurman started to farm on his own about

six miles away.

MH supported his effort, loaning him the necessary horses and equipment. Sometimes his brothers helped him with harvest of oats and hay. In 1924 he moved his family back to the farm and began to work with his father for ten dollars a week the first year and then on a percentage share basis. Joy May (Warner) Campbell, was born April 4, 1924; Lenabelle (Warner) Wellman, November 8, 1925; Joseph Harvey (Pat), March 17, 1927; James Thurman (Jim), January 4, 1930; Hildred Eugene, February 19, 1931 (he lived for three days); Ethel Ruth (Warner) Lees, June 11, 1932 and Jane Josephine (Warner) Droke, May 30, 1934.

Thurman and Josephine Warner

JH graduated from high school in 1923 and his dad asked him to stay home and help with the farming. He joined with his father in buying and selling sheep. Hubert wrote that he enjoyed working the farm but decided to go to Ohio State in the fall of 1925.

His last two years at Ohio State he stayed with RJ and Esther in New Rome. His part of the agreement included gardening, building and cleaning the chicken house. He would take the early morning Interurban car to High Street where he rode the street car to the Ohio State campus. Hubert graduated June 9, 1929, from Ohio State, with ceremonies in the new Horseshoe Stadium. During the next twenty-two days he bought a Model A Tudor with $600 from Louisa Belle, rented and furnished a house in Radner, Ohio. He and Helen Borst were married in the Urbana Presbyterian Church June 20. He was on the job as Vocational Agriculture teacher July 1. He recorded that Helen s parents, sister and sister-in-law were present at the wedding. His mother, Ethel, TG & HH were also present for the single ring ceremony. He paid the preacher $20. They had a picnic by the river and spent their first night in their new home.

Hubert and Helen Warner Helen was the daughter of Harry Elmer and Grace

(Hinton) Borst. On April 6, 1931, a daughter, Rosemary, was born and died the same day.

HH graduated from Ohio State in 1932. He had been a member of the swine judging team which took first place in the national collegiate contest and a member of the general livestock judging team which was second at Kansas City and third in the national contest. He and Helen Rheumilla Arthur were secretly married November 26, 1932. She was the daughter of Glen

Winfred Arthur and Myrtle (Hall) Arthur. She attended Wittenberg College and was teaching grade school in the Bath Township Schools. Teachers were not to be married at that time. Her daughter, Mildred Rheumilla (Warner) Schildkamp, said she doesn t know how they kept it from being known since she was

Hildred and Rheumilla Warner and Mildred born Sept.17, 1933. RJ was the superintendent in the Bath Township Schools; we can only wonder if they told him about their secret, since he is credited with introducing them.

HH began teaching Vocational Agriculture and coaching at Trio High School. In 1934 the team he was coaching came in fourth in the State Tournament. Duane remembers his dad said that he learned to coach from a book. HH then moved to Liberty Center High School, Henry County, for five years and Arlington for five more. He had many prize winning FFA teams and was a frequent judge at cattle shows.

The MH family was growing and Ethel tells about the Thanksgiving after Hildred married. With all the wives that had been added to the gathering, her mother had seated her at the smaller table with the children. In her protest of such treatment she simply sat on the lap of each of her brothers in turn and ate from his plate.

The Great Depression - Farm Lost 1934

The first ten or twelve years of my life were during the great depression. Of course I was not aware of how hard it was for the families of many of my classmates. Neither was I aware of the effect of the depression as a cause for my grandfather s moving. I was eight years old.

There are several stories about the loss of the Woodstock farm. The bank foreclosed on the mortgage because the debt continued to be more than could be met by the income. Farm foreclosures in the United States during the 1920s and 1930s reached heights never previously seen before or since. The depressed farm earnings simply could not sustain the family and pay the mortgage.

During 1928, the year I was born, the average prices of stocks began to rise and by September of 1929 had risen 40 percent. This boom was largely artificial. The decline in the stock market started a recession and then a crash that began Oct 24. BLACK TUESDAY refers to October 29, 1929, when panicked sellers traded nearly sixteen million shares on the New York Stock Exchange (four times the normal volume at the time), and the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell twelve percent. The losses for the month were sixteen billion dollars. Ten million banks failed. Thirteen million Americans lost their jobs.

Among my earliest memories is one of Mom feeding the strangers who came to our door asking for food. She would open the refrigerator, get something to warm and fix them a plate of food. (I also remember when the electric refrigerator was delivered in the early thirties). I sometimes sat with the stranger on the back steps and watched as they ate. Years later I learned that there was a camp in the woods near the railroad tracks at the edge of town called a hobo camp, and a map was posted showing that our house was a place to get food.

Elvira (Warner) Covey remembers being told the debt on the farm increased substantially when a buyer refused to honor a contract. MH had apparently raised a large number of Hereford cattle. When the herd had been fattened and ready to market the buyer said the contract called for Aberdeen Angus and the Hereford cattle were unacceptable. MH had borrowed the money for both the cattle and the feed. The market had dropped considerably and his loss was great.

One of the stories about MH was that he tried to get out of debt in a card game, bet the farm and lost. Aunt Ethel said this was not likely because she remembers the time when Thurman brought a deck of cards into the house. MH was furious and threw them into the flames of the living room heater. In later years she taught MH to play 500 Rum and he never wanted to quit at bedtime.

MH was not prepared for foreclosure on his farm. He was embarrassed and so were his wife and daughter. I overheard one of my uncles ask if the banker could have skimmed off some of the money. MH had always kept finances in his head. The family could not believe the home farm was lost but they did come to the rescue. Thurman found two available farms in Delaware County. The down payments on these farms were made from the sale of Thurman s Woodstock house and money inherited by MH s daughter-in-law.

MH and Louisa Belle

Could this be the herd of cattle that cause the loss of the farm?

The hard fought battle on the Calais and Woodstock farms produced a great generation. The thrill of making living things from the good earth was ingrained deeply in the hearts of those who grew up there.

The MH Warners began a new era with the move from Woodstock, May 14, 1934. Ethel, now 21, felt she was needed at home to take care of her mother and did not return to Urbana College. There were fifteen of us in the next generation born during the Woodstock era.

Some Memories from Woodstock

One of the first experiences at Woodstock was the day Hildred brought the measles home from school and all but Louisa caught them. MH was the sickest and the longest. It has been told many times that he said, Don t let that doctor leave, I don t feel any better yet.

Support for World War I made for an exciting time in Woodstock. The Red Cross asked for donations of livestock, farm machinery, and furniture. MH donated a hog and $50. Governor Cox and Senator Harding were there and made speeches. In 1920 they ran against each other in the presidential election. Harding won and is considered one of our worst presidents.

Juanita remembered a story told by her father. Roger and Rodney stayed with their Grandmother Gilmore and her daughter, Aunt Lib, for a time while they were attending Ohio State. There was a girl living there that could not walk. Each night the twins would hold her up and walk her around some part of the house. They gave her enough help and confidence to keep going. Later she was a nurse for Shirley Temple.

Ethel wrote what Eskham remembered about working in a grocery store. Some of the prices were: kerosene for cooking and lamps was 8 cents a gallon, bread 9 cents, round steak 25 cents a pound, and 41/2 pounds of sugar for 25 cents. The grocery store also carried shoes, tools, and gasoline for 15 cents a gallon. He opened the store at 7:00 in the morning and closed it at 9:30 that night. His pay was five dollars a week.

Dodge Overland Sedan

MH s first car was an Overland Sedan. It had side curtains to put up if it rained and for winter and he had to leave one window open or Ethel would get sick. She remembered they drove most of the way to her grandfather s funeral near Calais in Monroe County and then went the rest of the way in horse and buggies. James Wells Warner died October 14, 1918, when Ethel was five.

On that trip she was taken to see MH s sister Jenny who was bedfast and lived Gravity Gas with Aunt Nellie. Aunt Jenny was hard of hearing and held a rubber hose up to Pump her ear as a hearing aid. To talk to her you spoke into the metal funnel on the other end of the hose. This seemed unusual to Ethel and she would not speak into the funnel end.

It was in 1920 while working on a barn roof that the boys heard the first tractor in the area. Worked stopped as they watched and observed that the tractor was plowing twice as fast as a team of horses. MH reluctantly said, That s the end of the horse.

MH felt like a traitor to his love of horses when in 1924 he bought his first Farmall Tractor. Horses were still retained and used for certain chores as the development of equipment like corn planters, corn pickers and other attachments were becoming available.

	HH and TG had acquired an old Ford Model T truck for $25. JH borrowed it to move the possessions of his new bride. He loaded two washtubs, a washboard, a kerosene stove with an oven and her other belongings. On a hill headed for home the motor nearly stalled. He wrote, I shoved the pedal to the floor so the drive band would slide to the most power and
pulled the throttle down. It crept along. I thought sure it was going to stop. We did not have much brake but I knew how to use the forward bands to brake in case it stopped and started rolling down the hill. If that happened, I intended to back into the bank along the side of the road. We made it alright and laughed about it all the way home. The next morning HH drove the truck to Radnor. Ethel rode with him and they helped to clean the house for the arrival of the new furniture from a Columbus department store. The young brides in the early twenties were grateful for the coal oil (now called kerosene) stove pictured here that did not require the use of a wood fire and ashes.

Two Grandpa s Church Stories

This story began with a chair. Mom had told us that a low backed chair with a reed seat was from the church where her grandfather had preached his first, and fifty years later, his last sermon in 1916. Her grandfather, Cyprian L. Winget, had lived in Woodstock. During the Civil War he had enlisted and was serving in Kentucky. Mom wrote, Word was sent to his wife that he was seriously ill with pneumonia. She left her children with friends and went to the hospital where he was located and nursed him until he was able to be removed to his home. After recovery he went into the mercantile business in

Woodstock Ohio. He became very active in the Christian Church The Church Chair

and became an itinerant preacher.

Cyprian Winget died in 1917 and the Wingets attended his funeral in the Christian Church.

A short time later the Warners became connected to this church when MH learned that it was for sale. He bought the Christian church and attempted to make it into a Church of Christ. It was one of his beliefs that the Bible did not allow for any music in the church but the human voice. The piano was removed to his home where Aunt Ethel learned to play.

For some reason the church did not make it. I wonder if the pastor that was accused of being a spy for the Germans was one of the reasons. Some of the chairs from the church were stored in Uncle Roger s barn in Ashley, where over tine the parts that touched the dirt floor rotted. When this was discovered RJ salvaged the good parts and reassembled several chairs. These were distributed to some of the family.

The Christian Church

When MH and Louisa Belle had first visited Woodstock and decided it was the place to buy a new home for their family they had noticed two churches in town. It would be later that they

would discover that one of the churches had a very unique stained glass window. Twenty-nine men from Woodstock had not returned after the Civil War. The congregation of the Universalist Church memorialized the town war effort by depicting two Civil War soldiers in their stained glass window. This special window has in the upper pane a seal with Gen. John A. Logan s image and the words Fraternity, Charity, Loyalty. The bottom section depicts two soldiers headed on the march to war. MH did not like their doctrine of final holiness and happiness of the entire

human race, and wanted a church more to his liking. Even though MH did not agree with this church, Louisa Belle encouraged Ethel to attend Sunday school and sing in the choir.

A recent visit to Woodstock

On May 22, 2009, Mary Lou and Maxine brought Aunt Ethel to Woodstock, Ohio, where we met with John Westfall, a friend of Uncle Hubert. John took us to see the work being done to restore the church building. The local Lions Club had taken on the renovation of the church to preserve it as a Civil War memorial. Roof leaks in the main sanctuary had caused severe water damage and the pews had been removed. Aunt Ethel stood on the spot where she sat during High School Baccalaureate and pointed to where she had sung in the choir. All the Warners would have attended High School Baccalaureate here.

Universalist Church

John Westfall also took us see the house where Aunt Ethel had grown up. (1497 State Route 559) There were many changes since she had lived there. A large addition had been added to the back of the house and the front porch was gone. The big barn had been replaced with a building for larger farm equipment.

Aunt Ethel was saddened to see that the mulberry trees that had lined the lane were gone. One of the old pictures of the farm had Mulberry Lane written on the back of it. She remembered there were three kinds of mulberry trees and that she had to scrub the sidewalk several times a days because the ducks ate the berries and... On the drive back to town she told again about the blowing snow that stung her legs and said, It was right along here and I can still feel it!

The brick farm house was built by Orris Fairchild about 1844. The house was partly purchased and partly a wedding gift from Steven Fish, father of Orris wife Sarah. Their daughter, Susan Fairchild, born November 18, 1839, married Cyprian Winget in this house, February 1, 1857. Her first son Orris, was born here December 30, 1857. Orris Winget married Margaret Dunlap of Chillicothe, Ohio; and he was the father of my mother, Esther Winget Warner.

Below is the house as it appeared in one of the old pictures. The lane was on the other side of the fence under the mulberry trees on the right.

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Home of Cyprian Winget where Esther Winget Warner s father was born 1857. A brick and stone porch was added before the MH Warner family moved here in 1915 (see page 46)

The MH Warners occupied this house until 1934. This farm was home for nineteen years.

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